


love be yours and love be mine

by elizajane



Series: On the Strength of the Evidence [17]
Category: Grantchester (TV)
Genre: Consensual Infidelity, Drabble, Established Relationship, F/F, F/M, Found Families, M/M, Unconventional Families
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-25
Updated: 2017-02-19
Packaged: 2018-09-11 22:29:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 14
Words: 1,400
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9037490
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elizajane/pseuds/elizajane
Summary: Cathy and Caro take the children to Edinburgh for Christmas, 1954.





	1. when half-spent was the night

**Author's Note:**

> Written to fulfill the #TwelvetideDrabbles2016 challenge, this story will be updated in response to 14 daily prompts which this year take the form of Christmas carols. 
> 
> This work is written in reference to the conversation Geordie and Cathy have in church in [Fire With Snow I](https://archiveofourown.org/works/8242877):
>
>> ‘For heaven’s sake, Cath -- he’s got a service to give!’ Geordie hisses back.
>> 
>> She shrugs. ‘Yes, well, don’t forget Caro and the kids and I are leaving tomorrow lunchtime.’

The children asleep; Caro stands in the Keatings’ parlor window. Outside, snow falls against a darkness not so deep as it was during the war. In the winter stillness, church bells begin to ring the end of the service, the midnight hour -- Christmas has arrived.

In minutes there’s the muffled stomp of feet at the door, then an inrush of cold as Geordie and Cathy return. Caro turns, reaching for the whiskey and three waiting glasses. It’s here Cathy finds her moments later, unwrapping her scarf as she leans in with snow-scented kisses: “Merry Christmas, love,” she whispers. “Merry Christmas.”


	2. heedless of the wind and weather

The sky is clear Christmas morning, a stiff wind blowing the fine snow in gusts up the quiet street. The girls, sent out to play despite the cold, run in shrieking circles around the back garden with fistfuls of snow.

Caro finds Cathy in the girls’ room folding sweaters into suitcases pulled down from below the eaves. 

“Any luck,” she says, peering through the film of frost on the windowpane, “they’ll tire themselves out and fall asleep on the train.” 

“You always say that,” Cathy says, “and they always do … right about Wallyford.”

“Oh, let their auntie dream,” Caro laughs.


	3. all is calm, all is bright

Caro has marking to do, but as the train travels north into the fast-descending winter night she cannot bring herself to disturb the quiet of their car. Instead, she sinks into attentive ease as the children sleep and Cathy reads. She listens to the muffled _thump_ and _shuff_ of fellow passengers moving through the train, the _flick, flick_ of Cathy turning the pages of _A Pocket Full of Rye_. Caro smiles as she considers how later -- much later -- that night, in rooms they have shared since girlhood, she will pull the hair pins one by one from Cathy’s ginger curls.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [_A Pocket Full of Rye_](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Pocket_Full_of_Rye) was first published in England in November 1953. I like to imagine that Cathy has a weakness for Agatha Christie novels and that Sidney purchased this one for her as a Christmas gift.
> 
> My apologies that I'm taking longer than fourteen days to complete this, but I do plan to finish all fourteen chapters.


	4. love, the guest

“D’you remember,” Cathy asks, spooning herself back into Caro’s waiting arms, “the first time we made love in this bed?” 

“Mmm,” Caro agrees, eyes already closed against the night. “The little squeak you made when I slipped a finger inside you?” 

“Well, what _did_ you expect,” Cathy returns without heat. “Startling a poor girl like that.” They’re meandering down the path of a decades-old dispute.

Caro snorts. “Never heard you complaining -- not then and not since.” She finds the hem of Cathy’s flannel nightshirt in the dark. 

“You won’t hear me complaining now,” Cathy agrees, twisting about for a kiss.


	5. with thankful heart and joyful mind

“So lovely to have children about,” Mildred Mackenzie murmurs as they sit in the drawing room watching the Keatings at the foot of an impeccably-dressed Christmas tree.

Cathy catches Caro's eye from where she’s kneeling with Dora and Ivy at the doll’s house. Caro lets Cathy hold her gaze while she breathes her mother’s judgement in -- s _ince you’re unwilling to give us grandchildren, these will do_ \-- and out. As if her mother has ever found a child -- even Caro herself -- “lovely.”

“Esme,” she says, standing. “I must run to Jenner’s for a pair of gloves. Like to come along?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Jenner's Department Store](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jenners)


	6. forth they went together

Caro buys a pair of gloves she doesn’t need, and a matching pair for Cathy -- an extravagance twice over. Reluctant to return to her parents’ home in Charlotte Square she takes Esme to Crawford’s for tea. 

At a table by the front window, Esme swings her legs and reads her new book, _The Children of Green Knowe_ ; Caro does not chastise her. She and Esme, Caro thinks, understand one another’s need for silence. 

What her mother has never understood, and never will understand -- what Cathy will remind Caro of tonight -- is that she’s not borrowing Cathy’s children; they’re already hers.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [_The Children of Green Knowe_](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green_Knowe) by L.M. Boston was published in the UK in 1954.


	7. that goodly fragrance

“Dora!” Cathy calls sharply across the sand, the wind off the North Sea stealing her voice. They’ve driven up to St. Andrews for the day, and loosed the children on the West Sands after luncheon at a pub on the high street overrun by students. Satisfied Dora hasn’t strayed too close to the surf, Cathy turns back to Caro, adjusting the folds of her scarf against the snow-heavy air. With the movement, Caro tastes the scent of her L’Air du Temps on the wind and smiles. Cathy wears Caro’s perfume as a secret shared between them: _I’m yours, you’re mine._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> An extra thank you to Kivrin for [the perfume assist](http://www.fragrantica.com/perfume/Nina-Ricci/L-Air-du-Temps-1014.html%20)!


	8. midwinter, long ago

Caro finds the snapshot in a hatbox at the back of the bedroom closet: two solemn, gangly schoolgirls in knee socks and pleated skirts. Caro’s hair bobbed and pinned severely, Cathy’s plaits doing little to tame the wayward curls. She holds the photo gingerly by its white scalloped edge and considers what the viewer cannot see: that shortly after Uncle Morris had taken this photograph, Cathy had pulled Caro into the boot cupboard off the pantry. In the dark beneath the stair they had unbuttoned blouses, unhooked brassieres, and tasted one another in panting silence as the party carried on.


	9. old acquaintance be forgot

“Darling,” the bright voice comes with a slim hand placed on Caro’s upper arm as she turns.

“Helen,” she says.

“So good of you to come,” Helen says, though Caro’s parents are hosting the Hogmanay party. “I see you’re still looking after that school chum of yours,” said with a nod toward Cathy, across the room speaking with Uncle Laurie about proper irrigation for his tomatoes.

Caro follows Helen’s gaze, sipping her second-rate champagne. Helen always had been such a bore. 

“I hear you won honorable mention in this year’s flower show,” she replies. “You must have been so pleased.”


	10. out under the sky

From atop Arthur’s Seat they look down upon Edinburgh spread below.

“Much better from afar,” Caro observes.

“We’ll be off home tomorrow,” Cathy reminds her comfortably. “And the children have enjoyed themselves.” 

“Mmm,” Caro responds noncommittally. Esme is old enough to discern the tension between Caro and Mildred, and has cast them more than one appraising look. As observant as her father, that one.

“We needn’t keep returning, you know,” Cathy says, threading her gloved hand through Caro’s arm.

“It’s a clarifying contrast,” Caro responds, “reminding me of just how lucky I am.” She turns to accept Cathy’s proffered kiss.


	11. servire cantico

“ _Happy birthday to you_ ,” the girls are singing as they jump up and down around the kitchen table, “ _happy birthday to you, happy biiiiiirthday Auntie Caro, happy birthday to you_!”

Cathy puts the honey cake in front of Caro, brightly lit with candles that Caro makes great show of blowing out. Everyone claps and Davie smacks his hands on the tray of his high chair in general excitement. “Cah!” he crows, though whether for Caro or the cake it’s impossible to tell.

“Many happy returns of the day, my love,” Cathy whispers with a kiss against her cheek. “Welcome home.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> servire cantico = [serve it with a song]


	12. what your joyful news

“So,” Caro says as she and Geordie wash up the breakfast dishes. 

Geordie laughs. “And I was saying to Sidney just yesterday you wouldn’t last twenty-four hours before nosing around.” As if either of them had been at pains to hide their mutual delight in one another from Cathy or Caro.

“I take it everything’s in fine working order after all?” Caro asks, elbowing him in the arm. 

“Caroline Esmeralda Mackenzie!” Cathy calls through the door. “What did I tell you about leaving them to themselves!”

“It’s alright, Cath, it’s alright,” Geordie’s pink but smiling. “I know you both care.”


	13. the rising of the sun

The silence of a frozen river is less absolute than one might be assume. Inside the Natalie, Caro hears the current moving beneath the hull, the ice waking with the morning’s light to creak and shift atop the water. Companionable, undemanding sounds. Back in Cambridge, the day stretches out before her: fresh-brewed coffee and her typewriter. If she chooses, Caro need not speak a word from dawn to dusk: a treasured and hard-won peace. She slips from beneath the bedclothes, stepping into her slippers and wrapping her robe around her shoulders before striking a match to light the propane stove.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one's for [Mary_Jane221b](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Mary_Jane221B) because she was the one who [suggested](http://archiveofourown.org/comments/94243112) Caro was, of the four adults, the most competent at making coffee.


	14. love shall be our token

Since April 1947, Caro has worn a band of white gold on her right hand. Once a filigree brooch belonging to Great-Grandmother Fiona Mackenzie, the brooch had been one of several family pieces she, Cathy, and Geordie had put to new purpose. Two years after V-J day, precious metals still scarce, they had gone to a jeweler and made their request. In idle moments, Caro likes to twist the band with her thumb, remembering the sound and smell of spring rain in the churchyard as Geordie held the umbrella and Cathy slid the third band onto Caro’s finger: _I will._

**Author's Note:**

> Work title from Christina Rossetti's [Love Came Down at Christmas](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Love_Came_Down_at_Christmas)
> 
> Daily prompts (from which the chapter titles are drawn) are as follows:
> 
> 12/24: [Lo, How a Rose E'er Blooming](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Es_ist_ein_Ros_entsprungen) (Baker translation)  
> 12/25: [Deck the Hall](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deck_the_Halls)  
> 12/26: [Silent Night](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silent_Night)  
> 12/27: [People, Look East](http://www.hymnsandcarolsofchristmas.com/Hymns_and_Carols/people_look_east.htm)  
> 12/28: [Wexford Carol](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wexford_Carol)  
> 12/29: [Good King Wenceslas](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Good_King_Wenceslas)  
> 12/30: [Whence is that Goodly Fragrance](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quelle_est_cette_odeur_agr%C3%A9able%3F)  
> 12/31: [In the Bleak Midwinter](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_the_Bleak_Midwinter)  
> 01/01: [Auld Lang Syne](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Auld_Lang_Syne)  
> 01/02: [I Wonder as I Wander](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_Wonder_as_I_Wander)  
> 01/03: [The Boar's Head Carol](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boar's_Head_Carol)  
> 01/04: [See, Amid the Winter's Snow](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/See,_amid_the_Winter's_Snow)  
> 01/05: [The Holly and the Ivy](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Holly_and_the_Ivy)  
> 01/06: [Love Came Down at Christmas](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Love_Came_Down_at_Christmas)


End file.
